UK unemployment fell in September; Bank of England minutes show that support for keeping key interest rate unchanged at 5.75% was on a 8-1 vote

UK unemployment fell to a 2 1/2-year low in September as accelerating economic growth led companies to add workers, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS). Meanwhile, minutes of the rate setting meeting of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee show that members considered a cut in the key interest rate earlier this month and then voted 8-1 for no change, with only David Blanchflower supporting a reduction to counter a rise in corporate credit costs.
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How to buy shares and other securities

Successful investing is not just a matter of picking the right investments at the right time but finding the best, and most cost effective way of buying them.

Buying shares
Trading in overseas stocks
Buying funds
Buying bonds
Buying other investments

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Oil sprints towards $88

LONDON (Reuters) - Oil thundered towards $88 a barrel on Tuesday, hitting a new record and extending a rally that has added eight dollars in a week on tight supplies, strong demand and tension in northern Iraq.

Oil is closing in on the inflation-adjusted high of $90.46 seen in 1980, the year after the Iranian revolution and at the start of the Iran-Iraq war. Prices this year have averaged $67.

At 12:08 p.m., U.S. crude was up $1.33 at $87.46, off a high of $87.97. London Brent was up $1.22 at $83.97.

Oil has set a series of records over the past three days.

Investors have cited rising tensions between Turkey and Kurdish separatists in northern Iraq, sturdy world energy demand growth, tight inventories in consumer nations heading into winter and unprecedented weakness in the U.S. dollar.

"There's a lot of risk there and that is being reflected in the price," said fund manager David Dugdale of MFC Global Investment Management.

"It is difficult to find any bearish factors now. There's the Iraq-Turkey issue, a weak dollar, and inventory levels for U.S. heating oil are much lower than a year ago," said Tetsu Emori, a fund manager at Japan's Astmax Futures Co. Ltd.

The Turkish cabinet asked parliament on Monday for permission to launch an attack on the separatists.

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